Coronavirus in Coimbatore: Five more people test positive for Covid-19

COIMBATORE: Five people tested positive for covid-19 in Coimbatore district of Tamil Nadu on Monday, and two of them have no travel history.
The remaining three patients include a 27-year-old who returned from Chennai by road and a mother and son who returned to the district from Pudupet in Chennai. They took a bus from Chennai to Katpadi, and from there travelled in a train to Coimbatore.
All five of them have been admitted to ESI Hospital.
The two patients with no travel history include a 49-year-old cancer patient from Podanur and a 27-year-old woman from Kanuvai. While the woman spent half a day with her brother, who later tested positive for the virus, when he returned from Mumbai, the cancer patient had no identified contact with any positive person nor travel history.
“The man, who had flown down from Mumbai, had given his sample on arrival and had an e-pass for Tuticorin. Since he was anyway proceeding to Tuticorin, we allowed him to home quarantine at his sister’s place till his results came,” said a health department official. “Once he tested positive, we asked him to get admitted to hospital immediately and not go to Tuticorin,” he added.
After he tested positive, the health department tested the family living in his sister’s house, and his sister tested positive.
Coimbatore Medical College Hospital authorities issued a press note stating that a 49-year-old man from Podanur had been suffering from throat cancer for the past eight months and undergoing radiotherapy.
“He came to the hospital on Monday afternoon because he was struggling to breathe. Doctors said his throat had constructed due to the cancer and were planning to intubate him,” said the press note.
“However, his swabs were collected through the tracheostomy when he was wheeled into the operation theatre. He was moved to an isolated part of the ENT ward,” it said.
Once his results came positive at 8am, the patient was moved to ESI Hospital.
All doctors and staff who attended the patient immediately left and quarantined themselves. The ENT ward was disinfected.
“His source of infection is not clear. We have sent our team to his address and asked them to collect 200 samples at least including his family, immediate neighbours and whoever the patient came into contact with,” said the officer.
Another 27-year-old man working in Mylapore in Chennai, returned by road on Monday, and was in Vadavalli. His sample, collected at the border, tested positive.
The two train returnees who tested positive are a 35-year-old woman and her 11-year-old son who took the train from Katpadi. “They claim that they got into another person’s vehicle and travelled from Pudupet to Katpadi. They had no e-pass. We are interacting with them and trying to find the other passengers on their coach,” said an officer.